Canine Companions
by Qtness. Quill
Summary: Sirius needs help with an injury, Remus needs help with himself. What happens when canine souls are bared? My take on how they came together. Slash: SBRL


CANINE COMPANIONS 

**------------- Remus's P.O.V.**

Sirius was goofing off in class. Again. Today it was Herbology. I had just successfully completed re-potting my _Octotoxinospore_, a potentially deadly and dangerous plant with razor-sharp tentacles that whipped menacingly around the ugly, bulbous pod at its center, when it happened. The trick was to subdue it by waving your fingers in front of it (with dragon hide gloves being a key element here), lure all the tentacles into a bunch, then swiftly grab and bind them with a softened dragon tendon, then pack them tightly into the earth surrounding it in its new container. But Sirius had foolishly turned his back on his unfinished project to tease me, although I knew it was just his way to pay a compliment. He was sarcastically drawling to me (and I doing the obligatory eye-roll) about being a 'good little ickle prefect perfect student' when he got horribly slashed across his backside. He let out a terrific screech and pitched forward into my arms. A poisonous tentacle had sliced clean through his robes, trousers, underwear and into the soft white skin underneath like a meticulously honed virgin steel blade through Great Hall temperature butter. The gash was bleeding quite profusely. It looked damn painful.

Young Professor Sprout sighed. "Mr. Black. Hospital wing." His disruptive antics in class and lackadaisical attitude towards schoolwork had long ceased to garner him any sympathy from the teachers at Hogwarts. "I'll take him Professor." I volunteered, hoping my eagerness to be alone with Sirius wasn't too obvious. "I'm done already." She smiled fondly at me and dismissed us with a nod. James and Peter had paused in their efforts with their respective horrid shrubs, trying not to burst out laughing. The rest of the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff guys were eyeing their potting assignments more warily. Many of the girls looked after us, tearful and concerned (but also straining to catch a glimpse of what could be seen through the tear in his robes) as we departed. I put my arm around Sirius to support his weight (inhaling his scent deeply, but keeping my mind on task) as he hobbled gingerly next to me past the greenhouse door. I did not doubt that he would be receiving several "get well" cards from our female classmates.

**------------- Sirius's P.O.V.**

Madam Pomfrey mopped me up the best she could (and mended my clothes) so after quite a stretch of careful observation and tongue clucking about Octotoxin, she sent us back to the common room with a jar of ointment. We had missed lunch. Up in the 6th year dorm room, James and Peter's laughter exploded at us as soon as we entered. "How's your _arse_?" James asked with unholy glee and Peter collapsed into fresh giggles. "Not well, I'm afraid. An attack from an _Octotoxinospore_ is no laughing matter," Remus answered matter-of-factly for me. I silently thanked him with a grateful look. Good old, solid, dependable Moony, I thought. He nodded to me, sitting on his bed, and disappeared behind a book. I wearily made to sit down too but quickly sprang back up as if burned by hot coals (the reality of the sensation was not far off). This did nothing to quell the chuckles of James and Peter.

"It says here I have to put this on the laceration every three hours until it's healed," I informed the room in general, inspecting the label on the tub of goo Pomfrey gave me. "Well? Little help?" I said, dropping my trousers and stepping out of them. "What, you want US to smear that on the cut on your butt?" James spluttered incredulously. "Ha-ha-ha, cut on your butt" chimed in Peter (he was never one who could match any of us in the wit department). "I can't reach it very well given where it is!" I retorted, irritated, the pain making my patience run thin. "It hurts…." I was whining, I know, but whatever Madam Pomfrey had done was wearing off and it was beginning to smart pretty badly.

"James, you're my best mate…." I started towards him holding out the jar and turned around, glancing over my shoulder. "Ack! Point that nasty thing elsewhere!" He clutched a pillow up in mock terror, hiding his face. "I'd do _almost anything_ for you, you know that, but…but…" The pillow didn't completely muffle his laughter. "Butt!" Peter squealed, beating his dead horse of a joke. I turned to him icily. "You then." He gave a yelp and then a squeak as he transfigured (quicker than any of us had ever seen him accomplish it before) into his rat form and dove into his open trunk, under his spare robes. There was a reason I didn't ask Moony first, or second, and it had nothing to do with my not wanting his help. It had everything to do with how I had come to feel about him during this past year. I wasn't sure if I could stand for him to touch me there; I wasn't sure I could trust myself to behave. At least with James or Peter, I could pretend it was like going to a St. Mungo's healer, but with Remus…. That was a different story.

"Moony…" I quavered, pleading, attempting to make it seem like just another round in my requests (but doing my puppy-dog eye routine nonetheless, the expression he could never say no to). "Wha-what?" he stuttered, appearing red-faced from behind the book he was reading. "You c-can't p-possibly want me to…" He trailed off, mouth gulping open and closed like a fish out of water. "Well, I can't see properly and I _refuse_ to go to Pomfrey every few hours!" I pulled my boxers down a tad to look down over my shoulder at the welt across my bum. I leaned further, but it got farther away. Soon I was spinning in circles, never quite gaining a decent view. "Chase your tail!" James was positively hooting with laughter. "Chase your tail, Padfoot, you mangy mutt!" "Shut up, Prongs!" I snapped, wholly embarrassed at my predicament. "Fine! Remus, will you at least hold a mirror for me? All the mirrors in the bathroom are too high up to see what I'm doing." I knew that even if he weren't entirely comfortable with it, he would do this for me. That's the kind of man my Moony was—he would always help a friend in distress and suffering.

**------------- Remus's P.O.V.**

I took the handled mirror Sirius foisted upon me with jittery fingers. I hoped no one noticed. "After all, it was because of me you got hurt," I offered lightly, trying to explain my readiness to comply. "Don't be a silly git, it's not your fault I wasn't paying attention," Sirius backed towards me, delicately lowering the waistband of his boxers. I inwardly groaned. How did I get into this precarious position? My hands were shaking. "Hold it still! Ok, now up. No, tilt the top end. Up. To the left. Ok, Stop. There, that's good, right there. Perfect. Just keep doing that." He was peering back at the mirror, but unbidden in my mind I took the words out of context and put them into my recurring fantasies of sexual instructions from a lover named Sirius. James broke across my thoughts with unrestrained cackles, pounding his fists and feet into his mattress at the sight of us. Peter was transformed once again into his person (now that the coast was clear) and was sniggering heartily. I tried to look anywhere but at the vision in front of me—my trunk, the ceiling, the floor, my feet, the window, the door. I half wished all this could be as funny to me, to save me from the squirming below my bellybutton.

Though try as I might, I could not escape what I saw out of the corner of my eye. Sirius. Sirius's glorious bare ass. I'd seen it before, of course, living in a dorm together for 6 years how could I not? But never just inches from my own face before (and willingly put there at that!). It was if all the carnal hunger and downright lechery I'd had in secret moments rushed over me and I felt a stirring, tightening and solidification of rutting arousal. Oh, _no_! Nobody can know this could make me hard! I'd never live it down! I tried to focus on the angry red weal that marred his beautiful creamy flesh. It snaked from the top of his right thigh at its deepest, along the upsweep of his proud and perky right buttock, crossing the tantalizing cleft and continued, grazing up farther, getting fainter across his pouting left check. I wished I could take on his pain and make it go away for him (or lick it tenderly, as an alpha wolf tends to his pack-mates' wounds. Oh! Blast! Where did _that_ come from! _Stop that!_ _Down, boy!_).

Sirius began dabbing the purple salve on the least severe part first. He hissed in pain (but maybe that was just the treatment. It had started smoking on contact). I winced in sympathy. He sucked in his breath through his lips and gritted teeth but valiantly forged ahead. I could see sweat beading on his brow and knew mine was getting damp too. It was when he got to his right side, where the evil plant's maulings were at their worst that he gasped. He pulled up his right leg, hopping on his left and I had the misfortune (or fortune, depending on how you look at it) of seeing, square on through his legs, the dark flopping shadow dangling between them. "Uhhnghh!" I moaned. My battle to keep my complete desire at bay just lost. That sight pushed me to fill my final fraction and kept it there, a mighty stiff spire, all too obvious at the front of my robes. I doubled over and dropped the mirror, shattering it while running to the bathroom. Slamming the door, I locked it and pressed my forehead against the cool wood planks, breathing heavily.

**------------- Sirius's P.O.V.**

"He was all trembling and sweaty. Looks like he's gonna be sick." Peter announced, still sitting in his open trunk and looking ridiculous like he was about to sail away in a little rowboat. "What, did you fire one off in his face?" James asked, barely containing his mirth. "Shut up!" I snarled, pulling up my boxers but realizing my shorts were billowing smoke out the leg holes (admittedly, that would've been hilarious if the situation weren't so dire). "Moony's the only one of you lot that had the stones to be a man about it and help a friend in need! If he weren't such a bloody saint, it would be one of you in there puking your guts out!" I ranted on, masking my embarrassment with anger. "OK, so you didn't," James conceded, wiping his eyes beneath his glasses, "I suppose just having your arse in their face like that would make anyone have to wretch!" he mused. Peter guffawed sycophantically at James's feeble attempt at humor. My jaw clenched in fury.

"I said, shut it, you great prats!" I screamed, my wrath spilling over. "Just get out of here and save your best sophomoric crap for the 3rd years!" I threw the book at them that Remus had discarded on his bed when he came to help me. Somehow, railing Remus for being a prefect or a good student was usually acceptable for any one of us, but it filled me with an indescribable rage that he should be ridiculed for being the kind-hearted soul that he was. Especially since it was me that put him in such an awkward role. "Ok, ok…" James threw his hands up in surrender as him and Peter clamored for the stairs. They left without another snide remark, though after the dormitory door shut behind them I heard the raucous laughter again.

I just stood there in the empty room for a while, the pain in my clumsily treated sores receding. The silence from the bathroom was deafening. I tentatively approached the impassive barrier, but drew back, the scorn and rejection of my nakedness ringing in my ears. I wondered if it was the heightened senses I was gaining from transforming into a dog this past year, which I kept noticing more and more as I seemed increasingly able to pick up on things— textures of scents and feelings (for lack of a better word) than I had as just a boy but I thought I smelled something intriguing, not regurgitated stomach contents. No, just wishful thinking, I tried to dissuade myself with logic. Remus only stuck out helping me for as long as he could until my disgusting flesh pushed his nausea over the edge. He thinks I'm revolting. That's it. I'm revolting. "Moony?" I rapped softly on the door, feeling guilty at the physical trauma I had caused. "I'm really sorry…." I uttered weakly, feeling dejected. There was no answer.

**------------- Remus's P.O.V.**

I vaguely heard the other's voices sniping back and forth and then them leave from the bedroom. I drew in some long, deep drags of air. Settling on the closed lid of the toilet, I buried my head in my hands, embarrassed, my loins still burning. Aching! Minutes went by and it wasn't going away. "Ahhh…" I gave a resigned sigh, "It comes to this," I thought, "Again." I leisurely undid the front of my robes, pulling down my under things just enough and feeling the coldness of the seat on my bare bum. As usual over this last year, I imagined it was Sirius doing it. I closed my eyes and steadied myself, exhaling slowly. It all really started happening when the other Marauders had been able to run with me for the first time as Animagi. Sirius was a dog, maybe that was one of the reasons we have gotten so close. We experienced things together that the others could not. We wrestled, we played, we frolicked, we snuffled at each other and every other fascinating thing; we were quintessential canines at their best. We understood each other implicitly. And it only got more intense with each full moon—every movement, every posture, everything was entirely _free_ and _right _and_ fun_. Maybe that bond only held when we were beasts, but it seemed real to me, even beyond our transformations now.

I grabbed my tenacious "Little Wolfie" and began stroking. There was nothing else I could do about it, the urge was too powerful. I imagined Sirius calling my wolf name in a soft growl, "Moony…." I tugged harder. The black haired man (and dog) who dominated my thoughts descended on me now, touching me all over, then retreated in uncertainty. "I'm really sorry…." He lamented. "Don't be sorry, ever, I want you…." I whispered with craving, while in my mind I lured him back to me. "Please, Padfoot, I like it like that…." My brain's neurons and synapses were sizzling with erotic energy. Maybe if I hadn't been so wrapped up in reliving the dream I had about Sirius a couple nights ago (that ended wet) I would have heard the faint call of "_Alohomora_" and a click at the door. Instead, eyes held tightly shut and lower lip bit in concentration, I continued pulling my pud. Then, my inner wolf kicked in; I perceived a draft, the short hairs on my neck stood up when I felt a gaze and my eyes flew open.

And there was Sirius. Standing (still in just his undies) at the door with mouth gaping. "Fuck! The door was locked for a reason!" I managed to stammer while turning away in shame, clutching my robes closed around me. "Get out of here!" I gulped. My face blushed hot; I was caught red-handed! All was silent, but my wolf senses, ears pricked back, were telling me he hadn't left. My nose detected that hideous potion, but some familiar, delectable smells as well. Why wasn't he leaving me alone to my ultimate humiliation? The pulse pounding in my veins was amplified in the engorged area I'd been manipulating, and the thrill of horror at being caught didn't stop it. If anything, that fact, (in the small part of my brain that was still functioning), was overwhelmed by the naughty satisfaction that Sirius had seen me _wanking_. And it was that knowledge that wouldn't let my ardor die.

"I had to check…. I…. You…. Are you?…. Because?…." Sirius had found a few words but no complete sentences. I heard him faltering behind me, expecting repulsion and disgust in his tones but there were none. Where was the contempt? The not-so subtle suppressed hint of mockery? Why was there no derision? Then, I realized, when was there ever a situation that Sirius had been at a loss for words or jests? _When_? I accepted defeat; well, _this would _probably be it, walking in on _this_, that rendered the confident and cocky Sirius Black speechless. He who laughed at the world with his devil-may-care attitude and to hell with the consequences-- he who had no fear and flew in the face of any danger big or small. I chanced a glimpse of him then. He was gripping the sink counter, looking pale. Was that shaking in his white stretched knuckles? Was I really this horrible or was it just the pain of superficial flesh wounds? And exactly _what_ was that entirely foreign strangeness surrounding him? Was that…. _Vulnerability_?

**------------- Sirius's P.O.V.**

Remus turned away again. Good, I thought, he can't see how rattled I am. I could tell that he was obviously agitated but I stepped closer, a foot away, and tried speech again. "Moony…" I croaked; he remained silent, shoulders slumped. "I-I'm sorry." I managed to get out. "Well, actually I'm not. Were you doing…. That… because of how close we just were? I mean, well, having my ass in your face?" I half joked sheepishly, nervously running my fingers through my long hair, preparing for a verbal blow of recrimination. He cringed but didn't refute it. "Look, I didn't ask for your help right away because I didn't know if I could handle having you fooling around back there. Something's changed for me since we've been able to transform…." I trailed off, waiting for a reaction. What I got was not what I expected. He turned around with an odd expression on his adorable face. Was that…._Hope?_ Without instant rebuff it was easier to continue.

Heartened, I pushed on. "I don't know if it's because we're both canines, or what, but ever since then I feel like we understand each other. We've always been great friends, don't get me wrong, but this is as if we _know_ what the other is thinking, without having to speak, like we're two hemispheres of the same brain, in the same head. It started when it was only the full moon, but now, it seems like it's all the time, almost as if…. It's hard to describe in words…." Remus just nodded, tears forming in his eyes. "Don't be upset!" I hastened to add, thinking he was regretting our bond (or maybe just my admission). He was silent, then whispered, "I'm not. I thought it was all in my mind." He blinked and two droplets fell. "At first I thought it was just my own animal, visceral basic instinct, you know, lust but then it was more…._connected_," he quietly confessed in a rush. "It was….is…." but timidly broke off, refusing to meet my eyes. "Love." I finished for the both of us. He let out a dry sob and rested his forehead on mine. I can't even describe the immense exhilarating feeling of relief that washed over me at that moment! "Moony…." My voice cracked with husky emotion and my knees buckled. I staggered at the profoundness of the situation and caught myself from falling by gripping his shoulders. I, the great Sirius Black, was absolutely stunned for the first time ever.

**------------- Remus's P.O.V.**

I can't believe he said everything I've been feeling for this whole last year! The way he said my name after that revelation…. That is (and will always be) the most precious thing that has ever happened to me. We may have locked eyes for a second, or an eternity, that part wasn't clear, but the smashing of our lips together was. And once they were joined, they didn't come apart any time soon. I can't be sure how long we were enmeshed in that embrace. It could have been an ice age, or a wave crashing on the beach, or a moon's cycle--I know it sounds cliché, but time stood still and the earth moved. I guess there's a reason sappy Muggle love poems say that.

We were two animals and we were two men; these four elements of being fused into one. There were whimpers, whines, growls, howls, nips, bites, slurping, slobbering, scratching, squeezing, sucking, tasting, testing, panting, pawing and clawing (although I had to exercise great caution not to grab anywhere in the vicinity of Sirius's injury-- so I settled for everything else). I know, at one point in the middle of the madness, when it became clear we needed silencing and barricading charms, I somehow found my wand behind the sink faucet. With only a brief pause, I pointed it at the door over his shoulder with my right hand. Murmuring _"Imperterbatem!", _I sealed our steamy water closet against intruders--my left hand was still roaming his chest frantically, pinching a jutting nipple here and there. The wand clattered to the tile floor as I went to clutch his bicep again. We leapt eagerly back into the fray.

We both knew there had been too much yearning to take it slow—we were both voraciously greedy in our long-restrained ribaldry; the dam had burst on our denied desire. I gently expanded the waistline on his boxers with my thumbs to allow them to descend without scraping his tender wound. I shrugged out of my robes and they dropped away. I seized his hipbones above his injury and pulled him to me. There was no thinking. We pressed against each other, body to body, skin on skin—There was no stopping the grinding, humping, rotating, pumping, undulating, rolling, thrusting; we were utterly lost in rubbing our "magic wands" together in a fevered frenzy. We desperately clung to each other. I do remember a moment of feeling that if I let go of him I would go hurtling into space and disband into a million separate shining molecules. Sirius's breath was becoming ragged and heavy to my sensitive ears; laced with sensual moans of passion, it spurred my ecstasy to further heights.

I think it may have been my "Little Wolfie's" inevitable spasmodic jerking against his throbbing member that drove him over the edge, because he followed seconds after me in spurting hot viscous love all over ourselves. We both looked down and laughed with abandon. I'm not sure how long we laughed and kissed. It didn't matter. It was perfect. We didn't need words; we were communicating completely and fully without language. If I could somehow describe the mental exchange between us, centered in our eyes, it would go something like, "Yeah?" "Yeah. Right?" "Right." (Although in human language, it is _so_ woefully inadequate!). It's just that everything was _so right_, full of joy and wonder, and all was harmonious with the universe. I know it sounds corny to use the word 'cosmic' but again, maybe there's something to that Muggle sappiness. Maybe 'fulfilled' or 'completely contented' in their truest, deepest definitions could suffice. In any case, Nature certainly has a magic all her own when it comes to souls.

Eventually, I broke away and found my wand again and non-verbally invoked, _"Evanesco"_, vanishing the sticky mess we'd smeared against our sweaty, writhing bodies. Sirius raised his eyebrows in admiration at being suddenly clean and dry. We just grinned at each other and laughed comfortably some more. I _knew_ that we both knew we would be doing this frisky business as much as possible; converging and connecting, carousing and communing. And not only in canine fur at full moons anymore, but as humans, too, we would find our way back to this magic again and again. "Hey," I shattered the silence, the first one to take that step back into the mundane. "When's your next treatment of potion due?" my voice sounding oddly out of place. I teased him with a smirk and a wink, "I'd be more than willing to lend you a hand!"


End file.
